Haunted
by Bea Ryan
Summary: Takes place after 2x19. Miles is back from the hole and Charlie survived her encounter with Neville. Now she's trying to work through what happened in Austin, but she's not willing to let Jason go. Shameless Jarlie fluff, smut, and angst. Strong M rating.


Charlie tossed a branch into the brush beside the creek, clearing a spot big enough to lie down. Maybe the babble of the water and the heat of the sun would chase the dreams away.

It had been a week since Jason had died, since she'd killed him, and she still didn't sleep well. At first she'd been busy enough looking for Miles that she'd been bone tired at night and exhaustion had overwhelmed her a few times, but Miles was back now, and they'd taken a few days of downtime to let him recover. His body needed the rest, but her mind couldn't handle it. At night it raced, playing Jason's death again and again, trying to find a way to make it different. Sometimes he snapped out of it before she shot him. Sometimes after. Sometimes he killed her. She always woke up with tears on her face.

Jason had helped her adjust to her new life, to stuffing down her feelings, and ironically it meant they'd never really talked. They'd never named the relationship. They'd never discussed the fact that she could count on him to protect her but he'd turn on anyone else she loved without a second thought. She'd never admitted that there were times she'd turned on him, too. Would words at some point have made a difference?

Regret overshadowed everything else when she thought of Jason. Regret that she'd killed him. Regret that she'd never let herself think a word stronger than "care." Regret that one time, when both of them had their heads in the clouds from a rare long, slow moment together, he'd seemed close to saying "I love you" and she'd cut him off. He'd helped her armor up, physically and emotionally, for this brutal world she lived in now, and they'd both paid the price for it.

She stretched out, closed her eyes and tried to find something else to think of, some other vision to occupy her mind until she could drift off to sleep. Not Connor, that much was certain. She hadn't slept with him since she'd gotten back from her confrontation with Tom. She may not know what she wanted to do with her future, but grudgefucking a man who hated her family wasn't it. Jason had at least reluctantly respected Miles and acknowledged that her mother meant something to her, even if none of them quite knew what. Connor looked at them all like they were chess pieces in his game of thrones, and he couldn't wait to win the game and toss them all aside.

She concentrated on the feeling of the sun on her face and willed her mind to still. To sleep. She needed sleep. Maybe this time it would be peaceful. Maybe for once Jason wouldn't haunt her dreams.

"Charlie."

Her heart broke at the sound. Jason. And it was that tone. The one that said he thought she could save him from drowning. She was barely treading water, but she could try. She always tried to do right by him in her dreams, to make the space beyond sleep better than reality.

"I'm so sorry," he said.

"I'm the one who killed you."

"I made you. I hurt you. Over and over and I couldn't stop. I tried to fight it but..."

"And I shot you."

He looked like he was close to tears. She knew this part of him, the part that hated to hurt people who didn't clearly deserve it. She knew he'd done it, just following orders, but it haunted him.

"Come sit with me," she said, pushing off the ground and forcing herself upright. Her body protested - she needed rest - but her mind was stronger.

"The programming," he said. "I don't think that's safe."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"Looking for you, I guess. I woke up covered in blood and I remembered what happened and I needed to find you. I needed to know you're OK. I don't know how I found you."

"Sit with me," she said again.

He dropped to his knees in front of her and she rocked back, moving slightly away from him. This was too close to the way they'd been when they'd last seen each other, on their knees, her holding him as he died in body and she died inside.

"What do you want, Jason?" she asked. "Why do you haunt me? How can I put you to rest?"

"Haunt?" he asked, with a puzzled smile. "I guess we do have unfinished business." His smile faded and he looked away. She tried to remember the times she'd seen him smile. There had been too few and they'd been too far apart.

His eyes met hers and she knew he was going to say it, say what they'd always avoided saying because it was just too much to bear. The words were a sure way to destroy whatever meager portion of happiness they'd found, but why the hell shouldn't he say them now. He was dead. She'd killed him. It couldn't get any worse. "I love you," he said.

She fought not to answer. This was the thing left undone. The missing piece of her life that she'd never lived, never would live, and couldn't let go. This was the bit of him she still held on to. As long as she kept the words clenched tight, they couldn't escape, he couldn't escape. He wouldn't really be gone.

"Say it, Charlie," he said.

She tried to meet his eyes but couldn't, so she closed them, the tears slowly escaping all the same.

"Say it," he repeated.

She swallowed hard and opened her eyes, meeting his for what she feared would be the last time. "I love you," she said.

She expected him to disappear, for the spell of the dream to be broken, but instead she felt his hands on her hips, lifting her up, pulling her in, dragging her back into the same position she'd been in the last time she held him, but this time he didn't die in her arms. This time he kissed her, sweet and full of promise, as gentle as he'd been back when she was an innocent village girl out in the world for the first time with a man whose real name she didn't even know. She let go of the anger, the loss, the past, anything but this moment. He was in her arms and alive and in love with her.

This was how it should have been. What if he'd never become a soldier? He could have come to her village as a tradesman peddling arrows. God how long had it been since she'd seen him make an arrow? He'd have taken her hunting, with his bow and her crossbow, and they'd have brought a meal home to her family. Her dad would have liked him. Maggie had liked him. They'd have fallen in love, gotten married, had a family. She'd be his wife now instead of his killer. She let the fantasy take her and kissed him like he was the beloved husband he'd never had the chance to be.

Sweet kisses and soft touches caught fire and turned firm and hot. His hands slid down her back, over her hips, lifting her, pulling her closer, wrapping her thighs around him. She rocked against him, feeling his familiar hardness and grinding it against her own heat. His hands tangled in her hair, tugging her gently where he wanted her to be so he could plant kisses along her neck and hairline before whispering in her ear, "I love you, Charlie."

Their clothes seemed to melt away and she cursed the part of her brain that noted this proof it was only a dream. She needed this. Needed this world where they could love each other the way they always should have. She gasped as their bodies connected, so perfect together and too far apart for too long. He was the key, she was the lock, and home was somewhere behind a door they'd never gotten a chance to open.

Their bodies moved together, stroking towards bliss with synchronized rhythm of two people who cared what the other needed, so different from the rutting for distraction she'd settled for lately. They kissed and caressed as they moved, the sum of their actions totalling more than the parts, not just two dancers but a complete ballet. Slow and deep, she felt him moving inside her, inside her soul, and she whimpered as the sweet ache of it built, fighting to hold on to this moment, to make it last.

He wrapped his arms tightly around her and squeezed, hugging her while fucking her, and buried his head in her hair so she couldn't see his face. When he spoke, his voice was ragged and she thought she felt a tear fall against her skin. "I have to let you go soon," he said.

"No, you don't," she protested.

"Unless you want a baby, yeah, I do."

Charlie pulled her fantasy around her as tightly as Jason's arms. "I want a baby. Your baby. Make my dad a grandpa. Make Danny an uncle."

"Only if you'll marry me," he countered.

"We're already married," she said. "Bound together by love."

She sealed her vow with a kiss and moved against him in earnest now. She could enjoy this moment, let it climax and end, because she'd decided there would be other moments. He was hers, and this was the life they should have had. "Til death do us part" meant nothing when one of you was already dead. He'd be waiting for her in her dream world. It wasn't as much as she wanted, but if it was all she could have then she'd take it.

She felt him surge and swell within her and the rush of sensation pushed her past her own peak, higher and sweeter than she'd ever been as she pulled him closer to her, her arms and legs wrapped around him, holding onto him with all the strength she had. When they were both spent, she begged, "Don't leave me."

"I'll be with you until death drags me away for good," he swore.

* * *

Charlie stretched as she awakened and immediately noticed her body felt wrong. Her muscles felt used rather than rested, and, as she inventoried herself for injuries, she realized she'd had sex recently. Her hand slid to the knife at her hip and she tried to turn towards the person behind her without making it obvious she was awake.

Jason, lying facing her now that she'd rolled over, gently brushed a strand of hair from her face. "I'd ask how we got dressed, but since I'm not sure how we got undressed or why I'm not dead it seems like a minor question."

"That was all real?" Charlie gasped.

Jason nodded.

"Oh. Oh no. We… we weren't careful."

"Charlie, you are one of the bravest people I know. Be brave enough to admit what you want and grab it."

Charlie paused a moment and then nodded. For the first time since Danny had died she was ready to fight for someone instead of raging against a seemingly insurmountable challenge. If she had to fight for her happiness - and she was sure her mother and Miles would protest when they heard she and Jason were starting a family - then so be it, she'd fight, but she wouldn't ever again live with the ghosts of chances she hadn't taken.

* * *

Two miles away, the nanites controlling Priscilla twisted her mouth into a smile. "You can have Priscilla back soon," they told Aaron. "We're going to be a baby. Mommy and Daddy want us very much."


End file.
